By Daniel Béland

April 19, 2026

Nearly one year after the election that validated Mark Carney’s instincts about pursuing a career in elected politics, the principal casualty of that choice, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, finds himself in a peculiar position.

Poilievre, whose party lost that election from a starting lead of 20 points, who lost his own seat, and who has witnessed a mini stampede of MPs fleeing his caucus to help give Carney’s Liberals a majority government, is now leading the country’s second major federal political party in a sort of purgatory — coasting on the fumes from his January leadership review and avoiding an immediate putsch thanks not to the strength of his own popularity but to the strength of Carney’s as a deterrent to leadership rivals.

Nobody wants to run against Mark Carney, at least not until his honeymoon has run its course. And nobody — certainly not that anyone has reported — wants to replace Poilievre just to spend three years as Leader of the Opposition. Less predictably in the context of the left-right divide in Canadian politics, there are “establishment” Conservatives who are quite happy to see Carney stay right where he is for the very reason a majority of Canadians feel the same way: they appreciate his centrism and his competence.

Which leaves Poilievre in the strange position of perfectly acceptable seat warmer to many people in his own party who would also prefer not to see him lead them into the next election.

In the aftermath of five floor crossings, including four Conservative MPs, and more recently, three Liberal by-election victories, Carney’s new majority government further weakens the power of opposition parties and their leaders, including Poilievre.

For now, because the Conservatives are still trailing the Liberals in the polls, a Liberal majority government is not all bad for them, as it makes much less likely a snap election that Poilievre’s party would most certainly lose, at least if it were held today.

The four Conservative floor crossings since the fall (more might be happening sooner rather than later) cannot be blamed exclusively on what Poilievre called “dirty backroom deals.” While floor crossings are typically ill-perceived by constituents and seen as raising issues of democratic accountability, they are perfectly constitutional and have taken place regularly since Confederation.

While a prime minister can court and even entice MPs from opposition parties to defect and join their caucus, such MPs do not necessarily cross the floor only because of that pull factor, as their discontent with the leadership of their own party can act as a push factor, which was clearly the case with Chris d’Entremont, the Nova Scotia Conservative MP who joined the Liberal caucus in the fall and who “had grown disaffected with Poilievre’s combative leadership style.”

For his part, Poilievre is likely to have contributed to at least some of the floor crossings because of the way he and his team are managing the Tory caucus and the large shadow cabinet within it.

Nobody wants to run against Mark Carney, at least not until his honeymoon has run its course. 

At the very least, this issue seems to have been a factor in the rather surprising defection of “true blue” veteran Ontario Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu to the Liberals earlier this month.

And the results of the by-elections haven’t helped as a reflection of Poilievre’s leadership trajectory. Although they were not expected to win any of the three ridings in play, all of them saw a major decline in the percentage of votes the Tories received compared to their performance in last April’s general election.

This is especially the case in Terrebonne, where the Conservatives saw their support collapse from 18.2 to 3.3% in less than 12 months and with the same candidate, Adrienne Charles, running. As a feedback effect, this dismal result might create further incentives for Quebec Conservative MPs already dissatisfied with Poilievre’s leadership and worried about re-election to cross the floor and join the Liberals.

I agree with fellow Policy Magazine columnist Don Newman that “The Conservative Party’s Problem is Bigger than Poilievre” and that, since they lost power in late 2015, “the Conservatives have had three leaders, each of whom has lost a national election to the Liberals and been replaced at the head of the party.”

Poilievre was the right leader at the right time, as both a contrast and a gadfly, in the waning days of Trudeau’s tenure. But that polling match-up was always hypothetical, and Poilievre — by accelerating Trudeau’s replacement — all-but guaranteed himself a new opponent. In big-picture terms as opposed to the daily point-scoring in question period, that’s called an unforced error.

If the Conservatives want to meet Carney’s seriousness with seriousness, they need a leader whose success isn’t conditional on a weak rival. Which means the party will need to start looking at how to address its leadership problem now, even with Poilievre keeping the chair warm. The question is, will his attachment to the role, his belief that he can still turn things around, or simply his personality prevent him from helping plan a succession for the sake of the party?

If more Conservative MPs cross the floor to join the Liberals, that choice may no longer be his. The Conservative caucus may use the Reform Act to vote Poilievre out as they did his immediate predecessor, Erin O’Toole.

Even without new floor crossings, Poilievre should at the very least avoid making cringeworthy statements like disparaging Prime Minister Carney, a former central banker who holds a PhD in economics from Oxford, for, of all things, being “badly educated” in economics.

As Lori Turnbull, another Policy Magazine columnist, noted after Gladu defected: “Pierre Poilievre’s moment may have passed.” While many Conservatives may be happy to buy time while Poilievre stays put, if his performance continues to spiral in terms of both numbers and tactics, there may be nothing left for a white knight to save when the time comes.

A Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Daniel Béland is professor of political science and director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada at McGill University.